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Community Takes Part In Fort Smith Planning Exercise

Community Takes Part In Fort Smith Planning Exercise

BRIAN D. SANDERFORD TIMES RECORD Nick Cox, from left, Phil White, Bruce King, John Cooley, Bob Falkner and Dianne Morrison participate in an imagining alternative futures exercise on Monday, Nov. 18, 2013. The Imagining Alternative Futures Community Forum will be held again today at 11:30 a.m. at the Creekmore Park Community Room.

Members of the Comprehensive Plan steering committee guided residents to plan for the future of Fort Smith on Monday by taking part in a planning exercise for a collective vision for the city.

Monday’s “Imagining Alternative Futures” community forum marked the second round of forums to gather community input that will be considered as part of the city’s 18-month effort to update its 11-year-old Comprehensive Plan.

More than 30 participants gathered at the River Park Events Building at tables of five or six people to play a “Chip Game,” which designated certain parts of a Fort Smith map to certain types of developments.

The participants made their choices based on projections provided by the city’s consulting firm, Wallace Roberts & Todd, and an agreed-upon steering committee vision statement.

The vision statement calls for progress in retaining and enhancing community character and quality of life, promoting sound growth and development, growing and diversifying the economy and uniting the people, institutions and government.

Based on current trends, Fort Smith could be looking at an additional 13,991 people, 6,720 retail and office jobs and 1,680 industrial jobs by 2035, according to a presentation from WRT representatives Silvia Vargas, Brian Traylor and Bill Cunningham.

Based on the vision statement, the city could see an additional 19,000 people, 8,500 retail and office jobs and 2,000 industrial jobs, according to the presentation that kicked off Monday’s exercise.

Steering committee member Alex Nguyen said his group of six made sure not to neglect the north side of town and to focus on development at Chaffee Crossing.

“The goal that we had in mind was to envision — with the projected growth of the jobs and the population — where we would distribute things in the city to make it fit with our vision,” Nguyen said. “The balance is a very key theme here — it’s revitalizing areas that have gone down and building new areas that have a lot of potential.”

Dianne Morrison said she moved to Fort Smith from Hot Springs in May, and she hoped development of new areas wouldn’t cause people to abandon some of the old ones.

“Fort Smith has great neighborhoods and a lot of great older houses,” Morrison said. “I’d hate to see so many leave the great older houses because they’re like, ‘Hey, there’s something new out there.’”

Anna Schodowski, who moved to Fort Smith from San Antonio in May, said her group looked at the former Whirlpool plant site as a possible neighborhood center.

“We’d make it into an area where there’s a real community,” Schodowski said. “You’ve got your mom and pop place around the corner; you’d have a park there, you’d have some retail there, you’d have houses there.”

John Cooley, steering committee co-chair, said the exercise served as a way to physically interact with possible ways to map out the city in the future.

“It is helpful to see. There are so many areas that could use redevelopment or so many areas that are already growing that are going to continue to grow,” Cooley said. “It is interesting to see but it’s kind of hard to allocate resources to figure out how to do it.”

The Comprehensive Plan update officially began in May with an open house, followed by the first round of public forums in July. The steering committee was assembled in March by the Fort Smith Board of Directors, which will ultimately be asked to endorse the plan next fall.

Another community forum will be held at 11:30 a.m. today at the Creekmore Park community room.